MDC-T succession battles: Chamisa lays gauntlet

ACTING MDC-T and MDC Alliance president Nelson Chamisa has upped the stakes in the race to succeed ailing party leader Morgan Tsvangirai and lined up countrywide campaign rallies, to build his political profile ahead of this year’s elections.

By Blessed Mhlanga

He also met Western diplomats and provincial party structures on Friday to solidify his stranglehold on opposition politics.

This came at a time his MDC-T rivals, Elias Mudzuri and Thokozani Khupe, were disputing his leadership, albeit in an acting capacity, of the opposition party.

Mudzuri claimed at the weekend that he was still acting MDC-T president while Khupe also insisted that she was the bonafide party leader in the absence of Tsvangirai by virtue of her election at the party’s congress in 2014.

Addressing thousands of supporters at an MDC Alliance rally in Masvingo yesterday, Chamisa assured his supporters that the internal fights currently rocking the MDC-T would be resolved next week.

Chamisa told thousands of supporters, who braved the rains, that the MDC Alliance government-in-waiting had mobilised enough resources to resolve the ongoing cash crisis within two weeks after winning the upcoming crunch general elections.

“If we don’t solve it in two weeks, you must remove us from office and corrupt elements will be dealt with. We will not be selecting who to arrest and who should be left out, we want a clean and transparent government,” he said.

Chamisa insisted that the MDC Alliance had mobilised a $15 billion bailout package for the country, which will be rolled out soon after the alliance took over the levers of power.

“Zanu PF has no infrastructure master plan, but we have it. We have already talked about the money that we need for infrastructure rehabilitation for the next three years, $14,9 billion is the money needed and we already have it, and we have assurances. If we disclose the source, people will raise questions about the source, so I will not disclose it,” he said.

Mudzuri, who also attended the Masvingo rally, was not given the platform to address the meeting.

MDC Alliance spokesperson Welshman Ncube told supporters that Chamisa had been endorsed by Tsvangirai and, therefore, there was no question over his credibility.

“Tsvangirai said to me, I, as Morgan Tsvangirai, I will not be with you, but I will give you Nelson Chamisa and after that meeting I phoned Chamisa to come on the same day. He came and president Tsvangirai repeated what he had said to me in his presence,” Ncube said.

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